In memory of Sunshine: Keep On Moving thread for April 2024

[agate]

We no longer have Sunshine 2 with us but putting up this ongoing thread of hers in her memory may be a way to show that she left her mark here.

Feel free to discuss what you've been doing to keep moving.

MS creates some real challenges to keep on moving. It helps to inspire each other on how to find ways to move.

Did you stretch in your bed, swing your arms, roll side to side today? Or perhaps you did housework? Or exercised in a pool? Tracked your count of steps? Chased your cat around the home? Pushed the wheelchair wheels with your arms at the store? Post them here and we can support and egg each other on.

REMEMBER: this is a keep on moving thread, not keep on exercising! Any moving is important it doesn't have to be exercise! Even Science proves that.

[agate]

My average step-count for March: 1,954 steps/day, based on 31 days. February's step-count was about the same (1,995), and the two months indicate an improvement over previous months.

[flatcap]

Keep on truckin', agate. You're doing great!

[Virginia]

Very, very good step counts Agate!!!

[agate]

I seem to be the only person exerting....

If you move any muscles, that's exercise. Dusting a few pieces of furniture or folding laundry? It's moving.

[flatcap]

I have to admit being rather sedentary, but that is due to my having overwhelming fatigue most days. I don't sleep very well, usually in fits and starts lasting only a few hours. It is very rare that I can get a whole night's sleep in one go.

Combined with my depression, this makes it impossible to do much most days. I just don't have any interest or ability. I need to do something about this, but I haven't figured out what. I am being treated for my depression, but there are always leaks through which the depression comes to the surface again. In the case of fatigue, I have tried everything up to and including Ritalin and nothing worked. I am soon going to try CoQ10 and see how that goes. I am waiting for my PCP's approval. They always want to know what supplements you are taking, so I sent him a note through the portal asking whether taking CoQ10 would be OK for me, but I have yet to hear back from him. I think I will ask again tomorow.

[agate]

Apparently I had to learn the hard way that I can't just sit around on any day. Things start going wrong all too fast. Pain and stiffness set in--probably the arthritis because with arthritis it seems to be a situation where inactivity makes it much worse. No matter how rotten and unwilling I am to do those exercises and do more walking, I try to force myself to get with the program.

A while back I may have gradually reset my priorities and put exercise near the top of the list, maybe at the very top.

This kind of thinking has had some real payoffs for me. Those 2-lb. weights that I couldn't lift some months ago? I can now lift them for about 8 of the 15 reps I do with weights 3 times a week. I finish off the 15 with 7 of the 1-lb. weights.

The 6-year-old grandson easily lifted those 2-lb. weights. No problem for him. I still have a way to go, obviously, and may never get any better than this, but at least I'm finding it easier to lift heavier things.

I've found that I've had to just keep at it for a long long time before I start noticing any change in the way I feel, though. Building up strength and endurance seems to be a long, slow process and it's easy to get discouraged.

It's laughable for me even to be acting as if I'm some kind of role model. I should probably be doing far more exercise than I am doing. Years ago I tuned in to a half-hour exercise program on TV called "Sit and Be Fit." I was so diligent about it that if I had to miss a program, I taped it and played it later that day. It's still running but only at a very early hour 3 days a week, and so I haven't kept up with it since moving to this state. But that amounted to half an hour of exercise each day even though it was very moderate exertion meant for people with physical limitations due to age or disability. But now I probably don't get in half an hour of exercise on a typical day. It's a few minutes here and there during the day, about 3 or 4 times a day--little exercise spurts.